Listen live

Golf club wants fair way to share taxpayer money

Cup beckons: Alice Springs Golf Club wants a better balance in the allocation of government funds to sporting organisations.

ABC News

The Alice Springs Golf Club, which has been given a $300,000 grant by the Northern Territory Government, says there is an unequal distribution of money among sports clubs.

Details of the grant to the central Australian club were revealed last week by Sports Minister Matt Conlan during Budget Estimates hearings last week.

Mr Conlan had not declared he was a member of the club on his register of interests.

Golf club President Steve O'Burtill says there needs to be a fairer system of distributing funds, based on club membership and community use.

"Over the years, we have seen millions and millions of dollars poured into AFL and yet, say in Alice Springs for example, I can't kick a football in Traeger Park," he said.

"Yet the Alice Springs Golf Club, who I represent, spends $500,000 a year to provide a facility that the whole community can use."

Mr O'Burtill says there needs to be a better balance in the allocation of government funds to sporting organisations.

"Perhaps, and I say perhaps, it should be based on the number of participants in the sport, whether they provide a facility for the use of the whole community, and whether they also maintain their own sporting fields, and whether that's done by government or council," he said.